CHOW-CHOW DOGS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 6090, 29 January 1898, Page 2

CHOW-CHOW DOGS.

{Pall Mall Gazette.) The show of these animals at the Aquarium will surprise some people who thought they knew a chow-chow dog by sight. Certainly it is not " somewhat foxy in appearance, with a fluffy coat and tail curled over the back," as they recall the creature. But the enthusiasts who founded the Chow-Chow Club may be able to justify their assertion that wealthy Chinamen esteem this breed for eating. He who knows something of that monstrous empire is aware that acquaintance with the habits of one province gives him little authority to speak of those in the next. Somewhere, probably the Chinaman prefers a dog with a fluffy coat to the plump, hairless, leather-pudding creature which is termed a chow-chow in Hong Kong. Doubtless the Chinese are the only people claiming civilization who eat dog openly at the present day. Gossiping foreigners in Mexico allege that it is not only the Indians who love that dish, and one may incline to believe them ; for if it be nearly as good, prepared in the ancient Aztec manner, as the Conquistadores reported, it seems unlikely that their descendants would let it ba forgotten. But if Mexicans still eat dog, they will not confess it. The Greeks, however, regarded a stew of puppies, by a Doric cook, as the most delicious of food, and who shall question their taste? One Greek dish survives, as the learned think, and only one. It is bouillabaisse, preserved by the Phocfean colony at Marseilles. If stewed puppy were more ambrosial still, would that Professor Flinders Petrie could come aci'oss the directions for making it in soino Coptic dustheap ! An intelligent public would treasure that receipt beyond all the lyrics of Sappho and the plays of Menander. As for the Romans, Pliny says, " Our fathers thought sucking whelps a meat so pure that they offered them even in . expiatory sacrifices. * * * It is the usage also to eat theni at repasts in honour of tlte gods." In fact, red-haired puppies were Served at the inaugural banquet of the Pontifex Maximus. It must be such a dish which gives point to a jest of Thraso in Terence's " Ethiopian Slave," which is represented as a masterpiece, though it i seems duller even than usual to hapless schoolboys. Dog was the favourite food all over America at the conquest. Spanish chronicles agree that the breed approved everywhere was hairless, and Humboldt flicl not disdain to look into the matter critically. He found a hairless breed in Peru a"nd Central America, and two in Mexico. They are very like the common chow-chow, blacfc and shiny, with hair only on the face and the tip of the tail. Clavigero figures the variety, so famous still in his time, which Montezuma loved. But Humboldr, with the courage of German research, does not hesitate to declare him mistaken. Clavigero's dog is the large naked beast called Xotlotzcuintli — this would be its pet name. Now xotloti means servant, or, as applied to animals.tame. How could they use such a w.orrl as that for an eatable dog? We give it up, but, as a mere suggestion, it seems worth while to aslr what zcuintli means, because that might possibly explain matters. However, the small hairless variety is called Techichi, and chichi is Aztec for "to suck." Evidently this is the correct strain. Whatever its name or breed, the Mexican dog must have furnished a plat of supreme excellence as dressed by the Aztec cooks ; all agree on that point. Bernal Diaz had a strong prejudice against it, but after one taste, he owned it irresistible. While Moutezuma was kept in honourable captivity, those unutterable villains, his murderers, received their daily ration from the palace. And they always exacted a dish of dog. Belt tells a curious little ifitory. When staying at Segovia, in Nicaragua, he learned that the Caribs of Bluefields, our fellow-subjects, paddle up the river Wauks with a cargo of guns and iron pots, which they exchange for dogs, and nothing else, One would think they could find enough at home for their purpose, whatever it maj be ; but apparently they cannot. A black article is preferred, but they are noi particular. The trade is regular now, though lately established, and people in Segovia have taken to breeding dogs for the Bluefields market. The Caribs eat them probably — so far as Belt could learn no Segovian had asked, or even wondered,|what!b9came|of the animals ; alsothej may sell them to the Indians of Mosquito All red men are fond of dog. When travelling down the Mississippi in 1673 the Jesuit Father Marquetti was more severelj tried by the appearance of a " huge mastiff' which they killed in his honour andservec whole, at the festive board, than by any oi his experiences in that line. At the preseni day a favoured visitor may run the sam< risk, even among the settled Indians. "Young man," said Mr N. Peck, "yoi will neve"r know what real bliss is unti yon have a home of your own." "Eh?' said the young man, astonished at such i remark from such a source. "Fact. No body but a man situated as I am cai uroperly appreciate the delights of goinj up to town for a few hours of glorioui liberty." . . .v.